Hi Friends, and Happy Thanksgiving!
Welcome to the Gut Advisor Newsletter! In this issue I talk about the physical impacts of our emotions and why it’s worth fostering a grateful attitude
For anyone new- this is a monthly newsletter where we address new, or older but relevant, research findings as well as summarize recent findings or gut-related news. Here, “gut-related” is broadly interpreted, so we will be covering anything that might affect the gut, both “top down” and bottom up”. This means brain/mind things (‘top down”) such as psychology of stress, resilience, and emotion regulation, as well as body-based things (“bottom up”) including inflammation and typical comorbidities of gut disorders, such as pain conditions and autoimmunity.
Dr. Lisa Goehler
Table of Contents
Why I love Thanksgiving
I love all of the holidays. I really do. But, there is something special about Thanksgiving. For one thing, it is a little less commercial than most of the other big holidays. We don’t hear “Thanksgiving music” everywhere starting in August. You rarely see inflatable “Thanksgiving characters” festooning front yards. (I have to admit, though, that I do love the festive lights that appear when daylight savings time ends).
Thanksgiving is just a bit more private. It gives us a chance to gather with friends and family members (with time off from work! At least for some of us). There is something comforting about the rituals of Thanksgiving dinner – the turkey, the gravy, the green bean casserole (making that was my specialty when I was a kid), the sweet potatoes, and other dishes that families share for this occasion. Foods can serve as “social glue”, facilitating our connections with other people and our culture (Rozin 2005).
Thanksgiving can be a contemplative time as well, by providing a time out to think about literally giving thanks for our blessings. You may have heard that gratitude is one of the positive attitudes that is associated with better mental and physical health, and seems to be really helpful for resilience to stress (e.g. Kumar 2021), including socio-economic stress (Hartano 2019). “Trait” gratitude is inversely related to depression and other negative affective states associated with chronic disease such as IBD (Sirois 2017). That is, trait gratitude associated with better mental and physical well-being.
What exactly is “trait gratitude? It has been defined as “a general tendency to recognize benefits, experience abundance, and acknowledge anything in the world – human and not human – with grateful emotion and expression of this emotion that fosters both personal well-being and well-being of others” (Frinking 2020). It seems to be the tendency to appreciate things in life, including the little things, and being routinely thankful for what blessings you have.
Gratitude is also a key component of mindfulness practice, and mindfulness-based therapies have shown impressive outcomes for a wide variety of conditions, especially psychological/psychiatric and inflammatory ones, such as fibromyalgia (Carniero 2025). “Gratitude Interventions”, which are structured programs designed to encourage people to practice gratitude can help people who might not be “naturally” grateful pick up the habit, have also found that this promotes resilience. Mindfulness practices, for which gratitude is a key component, are associated with better Quality of Life in Inflammatory Bowel Disease (Christodoulou), and higher “resilience” scores are associated with less disease activity, less need for surgery, and overall better quality of life (Seghal 2022). In this way, maintaining positive attitudes, such as gratitude, can have a big effect on both mental and physical health.
How exactly gratitude improves health is not entirely worked out. Some studies have reported that gratitude is associated with lower inflammation, which would lead to less disease activity or symptoms, but the findings have been inconsistent. It has been suggested that “support-giving”, which is more reliably related to lower inflammation and tends to go along with gratitude, may be actually be responsible for the beneficial effects on the immune system sometimes seen to relate to gratitude (Moeieni 2019). Support-giving can mean providing emotional support for other people (“being there” for other people). It can also mean volunteering for civic groups or churches, or working in other ways to help the well-being of other people.
Both gratitude and support-giving can protect against situations that can give rise to loneliness, such as loss of family members, moving away from friends and family, or aging (Frinking 2020). Loneliness is an averse emotional experience associated with anxiety or sadness that is associated with a lack of social relationships. As we get older, it can be harder to make new friendships or maintain established ones. As you may have heard, experiencing loneliness is associated with increased inflammation, which can induce or exacerbate conditions such as pain or depression, and many other disease conditions (Park 2020).
The holidays can be an especially difficult time, when loneliness can “rear its ugly head”. For those of us who do have family and friends with whom we can share the holidays, they can be important times for us to engage in support-giving for acquaintances or neighbors who might be at risk for loneliness. Including people who might be alone during the holidays in your own festivities can help you both! When I was a child, my mother did invite people over for Thanksgiving if they might not have anywhere to go. My father worked for Boeing Aircraft Co. and one year (maybe in the early 1970s) two engineers from Japan were visiting the company during Thanksgiving. They joined us for dinner and what I remember the most was how much they ate: a lot! Later my father told us that our guests from Japan had asked the other engineers about what kind of holiday it was and what were you supposed to do? The other engineers told them that Thanksgiving was all about eating as much as you can.. So they did that. I only hope they enjoyed the food, as it would have been rather different than what they were likely used to.
Not all of us are blessed with family that we are compatible with or are local enough to celebrate a meal. But getting together with friends who may have similar circumstance for “Friendsgiving” is a wonderful way to celebrate the season, and be grateful for our friends!
Exploring food through history
Since this is the season to think about food…
I recently found a cool website called “Eats History” at eatshistory.com. I’m interested in what people ate in previous times, especially if there are cultural meanings that go along with specific dishes. What I really like about this website is that the author provides historical background for the recipes he digs out and he updates them so they can be cooked using modern ingredients and cooking techniques (such as cooking ranges instead of open fires). I’ve saved some of the recipes and plan to make them.
On the website it says that Donnie Dodson, the creator, “tells history and culture through a culinary lens. Through food, he tells the stories of empires, revolutions, forgotten rulers, and everyday people just like us in a way that feels tangible, entertaining, and unexpectedly emotional.” I would agree with that, and if you are also interested food history, check it out!
More evidence against ultra-processed foods
A recent article in The Guardian covers new studies coming out reinforcing the dangers of diets reliant on Ultra-Processed Food (UPF). The Lancet, a prestigious and comparatively reliable medical journal has just (November 18) published a three article series reviewing the literature on health outcomes of UPF diets, as well as recommendations on policies targeted to halting the expansion of UPF worldwide. The findings reinforce previous studies (the topic was covered in the our August 2025 newsletter) finding negative effects for mental physical health.
Toxic positivity
“Toxic Positivity”? I see from time to time, articles in mainstream media criticizing the positive psychology movement’s emphasis on regulating emotions and promoting the development of positive attitudes such as optimism and gratitude. For instance, this article in Psychology Today.
Opponents of positive psychology’s emphasis on cultivating positive emotions such as optimism and gratitude argue that negative emotions such as fear and anger are critical to survival and motivation. Positive emotions may make us more gullible or overconfident. Critics go on to claim that teaching people that they can have control over their emotions and happiness has led corporations and politicians to blame people for their problems, ranging from psychiatric conditions such as depression to socioeconomic stress.
Is “positivity” really so toxic?
One thing that I have noticed about the critics is they lack a background in multidisciplinary fields, such as psychoneuroimmunology, that have revealed the physiological, immunological, and neurological benefits of positive emotions such gratitude and feelings of social connectedness. They may even lack a background in psychology. This has sometimes made me wonder- why they are so opposed to something that they don’t seem to understand?
Legitimate proponents of “positive psychology”, mindfulness, gratitude training, and other positive kinds of lifestyle, are not saying that we should suppress all of our negative emotions, and that it’s only OK to be “happy”. No one is saying that if you aren’t happy it is all your fault. Rather, the idea is that in fact, if we want to be happier, we can be. And this can provide benefits for psychological and mental health. The emphasis is not on suppressing emotions, but rather upon noticing them, finding the meaning in them, and then regulating them (e.g. Grecucci 2015). In fact, positive emotions can support resilience to frightening or traumatic events, such as the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the U.S. (Fredrickson 2003), and the COVID 19 pandemic (Zurko 2022).
I find it interesting that critics point out that corporations and politicians may use positive psychology as a way to deflect responsibility for societal problems, while overlooking said entities use of negative emotions (stress, fear of losing job) to “motivate” people.
I also wonder if people who defend expressing negative emotions realize the effects of negative emotions on other people. There is a reason for the terms “Debbie Downer” and “toxic personality”. We are influenced by the emotional states of other people. Interestingly, a neuroimaging study investigating neurological correlates of gratitude found activation in brain regions known to be involved with social reward, intrapersonal bonding, social support, and relief from pain (Fox 2015). These findings link positive emotions such as gratitude with positive interpersonal interactions and relationships, which can help promote resilience to stress, and… feeling “happy”.
I do want to clarify that there is another notion out there where people use “toxic positivity” to refer to people or attitudes that completely avoid negative emotions from themselves, their communities, or their friends and family. Perhaps a friend just lost their job and, instead of sitting with them in this moment of sadness and stress and letting their friend “vent”, a “toxically-positive” friend may insist on “looking on the bright side” or changing the subject entirely to avoid feeling uncomfortable. Ultimately, this avoidant behavior can create distance between someone and their loved ones or community instead of fostering vulnerability and support-systems. So yeah, pretty toxic!
A positive attitude is not about totally avoiding negative emotions (which is impossible and unhealthy, as life is hard and we’re human), but about acknowledging our feelings and looking for ways to be grateful and finding the small joys in everyday life. Unfortunately, the term “toxic positivity” seems to be conflating all kinds of positivity with toxicity. I worry that people will automatically avoid cultivating truly positive emotion and attitudes that can buttress reliance to stress and promote physical and mental health.
Every month, we pick a published (and peer reviewed) article to highlight and discuss.
This month’s selected article
Title
Gratitude and loneliness in adults over 40 years: examining the role of psychological flexibility and engaged living.
Authors
Frinking E, Jans-Beken L, Janssens M, Peeters S, Lataster J, Jacobs N, Reijnders J.
Publication
Aging Ment Health. 2020 Dec;24
Exploring the role and effects of attitude and lifestyle in people over 40 years old.
I think this paper is worth a read! Check it out →
The article highlights negative consequences of loneliness for mental and physical health, and notes the many different contributing factors that can lead to loneliness. The authors explore ways that gratitude and “psychological flexibility and engaged living” may prevent or mitigate loneliness. They explored the empirical relations between gratitude and engaged living in a population of older (40 years +) in The Netherlands using questionnaire attitude scales.
Key points
Psychological flexibility is defined as “the ability to flexibly cope with adversity, thereby promoting engagement in personal meaningful or valued activities”.
Psychological flexibility decreases with age, and this lack may hinder people from engaging in activities that may prevent loneliness.
Engaged living means being actively involved in activities that you find meaning in, such as hobbies, exercise, volunteering, faith-based activities, rewarding career activities, and social relationships.
In their sample, men were less grateful than women (!).
People who were more grateful were less lonely and more engaged in living.
More highly educated people scored higher in psychological flexibility and lower in loneliness.
As in other studies, the older participants reported more loneliness.
Interestingly, the statistical analysis revealed that gratitude accounted for the protective effect of engaged living on loneliness. In other words, engaged living by itself is not enough to prevent loneliness.
The findings indicate that the combination of gratitude and psychological flexibility were most important for avoiding loneliness. This suggests that “Grateful individuals may have learned to accept that life can be good but also that life knows times of suffering, and they understand situations, their own identity and other people”.
Overall, the article underlines the importance of gratitude, finding meaning in life as well as meaningful activities in helping us develop and maintain social connections, which can buffer the risk of loneliness.
Try a salad for an upset stomach
Here we will pass on “tips” or observations from practitioners or patients about approaches they found helpful for dealing with symptoms of gut problems or ways to keep the gut healthy that have not yet been tested with clinical trials. So, the evidence is anecdotal but may be worth trying.
This one comes from my daughter! On those random days where your stomach doesn’t feel great (but doesn’t exactly feel totally sick), a green and crunchy salad with some balsamic vinaigrette frequently helps. The salad is nothing crazy: crunchy greens, balsamic vinaigrette, cracked black pepper, and maybe topped with some light feta.
If anyone has any other tips for how to deal with food allergies or other gut issues, please do not hesitate to send them to [email protected].
I won’t mention your name if you don’t want me to.
Thanks!
Do you have a tip for us? Let us know!
Every month we will highlight an easy to make, gut-healthy dish that we are eating now!
Turkey posole made with Thanksgiving turkey bone broth
There are many reasons to love Thanksgiving dinner- the stuffing! The cranberry sauce! The champ! (cheesy mashed potatoes and chives- the National Dish of Ireland and a tradition in our family). But the turkey is the cornerstone of the meal. We always shell out for a good one- a heritage turkey given good food and allowed to run around. It’s worth it, because it tastes delicious and the meals we make with the left-over turkey and gravy feed us until Christmas. Other turkeys can be good too of course, if brined and stuffed with aromatic herbs while cooking.
Before cooking it we brine it for a day (24 hours, double-bagged, in a cooler), and then rinse really well. Then we stuff it with sprigs of rosemary, chunks of garlic, and quartered lemons. I stuff in as much of that as I can!
(The brine:
Apple cider- one gallon Molasses- 1 cup Kosher salt- 1 cup Garlic powder- 1 Tablespoon Poultry seasoning- 1 Tablespoon Rosemary- 1 sprig Orange rinds- 3 (or 4) halves, cut in STRIPS/chunks Peppercorns, freshly ground, about 1 teaspoon
Heated up to dissolve salt & allowed to cool.)
Later, when we have carved off all the meat that we can, I put everything left into a large stock pot -the carcass, skin, rosemary, garlic, and lemons, and any other scraps. I cover all that with about 8-10 quarts of water (enough to cover), and then simmer until the bones start to fall apart.
I remove all the bones and other remnants and put in a large bowl. Then I strain the broth into a large pot, periodically ladling some into quart containers. I usually get 6-8 containers filled, which go right into the freezer. It’s great broth for soups such as pea soup and pumpkin soup, as well as for other typical uses for broth. Bone broth, unlike other broths, has a fair amount of protein so it is more nutritious and satisfying than other broths, at least to me. Our turkey broth is particularly delicious because of the rosemary, lemon and garlic in it.
I reserve about a quart or so, to make posole (pronounced “po so lay”).
Next, I sort through the bones to get all the meat (and there is quite a lot!) that we couldn’t carve off but is now accessible because the bones have fallen apart. I’m always amazed at how much meat is in the back. This meat goes into the posole.
Ingredients
About one quart turkey bone broth
Turkey- recovered from the carcass or also left-over from carving if wished, about 2 cups with large pieces chopped to bite-size
3 cans Posole (aka hominy) 14.5 oz each, preferably of a brand such as Bushes, which contains individual corn kernels (mostly) rather than one giant clump (the kernels need to be separate). If it comes in a clump, pull out into a bowl and separate the kernels.
Roasted portobello mushroom chunks from 3 or 4 large caps, with their broth- cut mushroom caps into 1 inch square pieces, toss in olive oil and roast for about 20 minutes at 350 degrees F.
1 jar green chile salsa, 12 oz
1 jar red chile salsa, 12 oz
1 can tomatoes, 14.5
Garlic powder, ancho chile powder, oregano, basil; to taste/preference , in the teaspoon to tablespoon range.
Garnishes
1 or 2 green onions per serving, sliced
Pepper Jack cheese, grated
1 avocado, total, diced and tossed in lime juice
Blue corn tortilla chips
Steps
Combine ingredients and heat to a boil.
Garnish as you like!
Enjoy!
Community Affairs
Aesthetic changes
My website and branding is undergoing a bit of a change (new colors!), so if you were confused by the orange and purple, that’s why! These changes will me incorporated into next months email newsletter as well.
About the Author
Lisa E. Goehler, Ph.D. is a neuroscientist and expert in the science and treatment of psychological stress, chronic inflammation, and gut-related disorders. She pioneered the study of how GI-tract related bacteria can interact with the brain to lower mood and increase anxiety. Throughout her career, she authored over fifty publications and contributed to peer review for scientific journals and funding agencies, including the National Institute for Health.
References
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